I’d Rather Have a Yugo
Tesla has no more business being in business than Yugo.
Which isn’t anymore.
So why is Tesla?
Because political correctness, crony capitalism – and a hallucinatory desire to believe in a mirage; to refuse to admit that what you think you see in the distance isn’t actually there; that your mind isn’t playing tricks on you.
But then, the Yugo was just a bad car.
The Tesla is a bad electric car – and the electric part effaces the bad part. Electric cars can do no wrong – to an extent that is quite literally unbelievable. Unless you’ve seen it – and then you will believe.
I’m exaggerating?
Ok, how’s this:
An extremely embarrassing story broke the other day that two-thirds of Tesla drivetrains – their electric motors, specifically – are destined to require replacement before the cars reach 60,000 miles. This according to an independently commissioned Weibull Reliability Engineering Resources analysis of actual Tesla failure rates and customer reported problems to date (see here).
Two-thirds.
Before 60,000 miles roll by.
Let it roll around in your mouth for a little bit.
How’s it taste?
Lemony, perhaps?
It is inconceivable that any normal car company could survive such a revelation. The likely – the near-inevitable – failure of the car’s very heart, the thing that makes it go? If a third of new Chevrolets needed a new engine before 60,000 miles elapsed, Chevrolet would not be selling cars at all.
But two-thirds of them?
People would be rioting.
And the government would be ululating the regulatory equivalent of allah akbar. Yet the government is silent. No outraged congress cretins are holding press conferences, demanding hearings. NHTSA is not threatening to recall the electric lemons.
Why?